The main objective of the following essay is to discuss what works in preventing offences involving weapons by looking at various techniques used in crime prevention by different agencies. It will cover the four crime prevention techniques outlined by Tilley (2009); social; situational; criminal justice and individual approaches whilst also discussing what has been successful and what has not worked in the implementation of these techniques. Offences involving weapons is any offence committed with the use of either a knife or other sharp instrument or a firearm including an imitation firearm and an air weapon (Office for National Statistics, 2017a). From the Office for National Statistics (2018b) it shows that between the years 2017 and 2018 there was 41,884 offences involving a knife or sharp instrument which is a 12% increase from the police recorded data the year before in contrast to a 5% decrease from the previous year in offences involving firearms as there was 6,362 recorded. In the year ending March 2017, Nottinghamshire saw 119 firearm offences of which the most common age category to be a victim was 20-24 (Office for National Statistics, 2017). However, you cannot just rely on police recorded data to see if there is a genuine increase in offences involving weapons. One reason for this is because the police may be recorded more incidences under this category than they were a few years ago as members of the public carrying weapons is becoming more common meaning the police are taking more crimes involving weapons a lot more seriously (BBC, 2018). This therefore shows that you can not always rely on police recorded data as the amount of crimes occurring may be at the same rate but the police are recorded more under that category making the public believe these incidents are happening a lot more. Tilley (2009 p.3) proposed four crime prevention approaches and suggested there needed to be a theory for crime prevention as crime is ever-changing and complex. The four approaches are; criminal justice approach, individual approach, situational approach and the social approach. These can be used individually to prevent crime or a mixture of different techniques from each approach can be used to help prevent one particular crime. Smith, MJ. And Clarke, RV. (2012) claim that situational crime prevention is a technique that focuses on changing what causes crime in the immediate environment in an aim to prevent crime from happening. Severin L. Sorensen (2017) stated that situational crime prevention is about “increasing risk and reducing reward” so that crime is not as appealing to the offenders and they are being punished rather than rewarded. He also states that target hardening needs to be>